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Serial Verb Constructions Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Palackého Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky Serial Verb Constructions (Bakalářská práce) 2015 Timotej Šefčovič Serial Verb Constructions (Bakalářská práce) Autor: Timotej Šefčovič Studijní obor: Anglická filologie - Japonská filologie Vedoucí práce: Joseph Embley Emonds Prof. Počet stran: 75 Počet znaků: 88 063 (bez mezer) Olomouc 2015 I declare that I elaborated this paper myself and that I mentioned the absolute list of works cited. In Olomouc on the day ………………………………………………... Acknowledgement However various or complex the language is, there will never be enough words for those who have been supporting me or even contributed directly to successful completing of this research. My modest and humble “thank you” belongs to the teachers from the Japanese section of the Asian department at Palacký University for the knowledge of Japanese; to the members of the English department who have supported me in my enthusiasm for linguistics; to the teachers at Utsunomiya University, among other things, also for the knowledge of Korean; to my friends and especially to my family who have helped me in many other ways. Above all, my deepest gratitude belongs to my supervisor Prof. Joseph Emonds especially for his permanent support and valuable advice that helped me to successfully finish this bachelor thesis. Abstract This thesis deals with morphological and syntactic properties of Serial Verb Constructions (SVCs). The SVCs can be found across languages from different parts of the world, especially in Bantu languages in Central Africa, and some Asian languages. However, there are also languages (e.g. Germanic ones) that seem to lack these constructions created by the process of serialization. The objective of this thesis is to first analyse their structure and sum up their morphological and syntactic properties that were previously demonstrated by other linguists. Secondly, a new proposal concerning the fact that SVCs can be also found in Japanese is made. In order to fulfil this task, a closer look is held on Korean whose word order is identical to that in Japanese. The final part of this thesis questions previous approaches to SVCs in Japanese, especially concerning their terminology. Afterwards, the outcome of this thesis suggests whether the previous approaches should be preserved or whether they should be updated and unified under a new terminology. Having examined the properties of SVCs in Korean and Japanese, we move back to the syntax of English, where English bare infinitives are compared to the already discussed SVCs. Key words SVCs, verb, English bare infinitives, Japanese, Korean, compound, serialization, transitivity, argument Anotace Tato práce se zabývá morfologickými a syntaktickými vlastnostmi konstrukcí sériových sloves. Sériová slovesa lze nalézt v různých jazycích z různých částí světa, zejména v bantu jazycích ve střední Africe nebo v jiných asijských jazycích. Nicméně, existují i jazyky, například germánské, pro které nejsou tyto konstrukce vytvořené procesem serializace běžné. Cílem této práce je nejprve analyzovat jejich strukturu a shrnout jejich morfologické a syntaktické vlastnosti. Všechny už byly dříve analyzovány jinými lingvisty. Za druhé je tu vyslovena teorie, že sériová slovesa se nacházejí i v japonštině. Pro splnění tohoto úkolu je využito korejštiny, která má slovosled stejný jako japonština. Závěrečná část této práce analyzuje předcházející přístupy k sériovým slovesům v japonštině, zejména jejich terminologii. Poté tato práce navrhuje, zda by měla být zachována předchozí terminologie, nebo zda by měla být aktualizována a sjednocena pod jedním termínem. Poté se dostáváme zpátky k angličtině, kde budou porovnány už vzpomínaná sériová slovesa s anglickými holými infinitivy. Klíčová slova sériová slovesa, sloveso, holý infinitiv, japonština, korejština, složenina, serializace, tranzitivita, argument TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................ 9 2 SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS: THE ENGLISH SUBCASE ............................................ 11 2.1 WHAT ARE (NOT) SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ................................................................. 11 2.2 ENGLISH COMPOUND VERBS ...................................................................................................... 12 2.3 ENGLISH BARE INFINITIVES ....................................................................................................... 16 2.4 CONCLUSION: ENGLISH V-V AND SVCS ..................................................................................... 18 3 GENERAL PROPERTIES OF SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ....................................... 19 3.1 INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................... 19 3.2 NO OVERT MARKER ................................................................................................................... 20 3.3 SUBJECT SHARING ....................................................................................................................... 21 3.4 TENSE SHARING .......................................................................................................................... 22 3.5 NEGATION ................................................................................................................................... 22 3.6 HEADEDNESS ............................................................................................................................... 23 4 JAPANESE SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ....................................................................... 25 4.1 INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................... 25 4.2 NO OVERT MARKER ................................................................................................................... 26 4.3 SUBJECT SHARING ....................................................................................................................... 28 4.4 TENSE SHARING .......................................................................................................................... 29 4.5 NEGATION ................................................................................................................................... 30 4.6 HEADEDNESS ............................................................................................................................... 31 4.7 CONCLUSION CONCERNING SVCS IN JAPANESE .......................................................................... 34 5 SYNTAX AND TRANSITIVITY OF SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ............................. 36 5.1 ARGUMENT STRUCTURE ............................................................................................................. 36 5.2 INTRANSITIVE V1 + INTRANSITIVE V2 ..................................................................................... 37 5.3 INTRANSITIVE V1 + TRANSITIVE V2 ......................................................................................... 38 5.4 TRANSITIVE V1 + TRANSITIVE V2 ............................................................................................ 42 5.5 TRANSITIVE V1 + INTRANSITIVE V2 ......................................................................................... 44 5.6 TRANSITIVE V1 + DITRANSITIVE V2 ........................................................................................ 46 5.7 CONCLUDING REMARKS .............................................................................................................. 48 6 TERMINOLOGY GAPS ................................................................................................................ 49 6.1 A PREVIOUS APPROACH TO SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ................................................... 49 6.2 A COMPOUND VERB .................................................................................................................... 49 6.3 TWO TYPES OF “COMPOUND VERBS” ........................................................................................ 52 6.3.1 “SYNTACTIC COMPOUND VERBS” ........................................................................................................... 52 6.3.2 “LEXICAL COMPOUND VERBS” ................................................................................................................. 55 6.4 CONCLUSION CONCERNING KAGEYAMA’S TERMINOLOGY ........................................................ 57 7 A CROSS-LINGUISTIC COMPARISON IN ENGLISH, JAPANESE, KOREAN ................... 59 7.1 GAPPING ...................................................................................................................................... 60 7.2 STRESS ASSIGNMENT .................................................................................................................. 63 7.3 CONCLUSION CONCERNING ENGLISH BARE INFINITIVES .......................................................... 65 8 SUMMARY .................................................................................................................................... 67 9 ČESKÉ RESUMÉ ........................................................................................................................... 69 10 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................. 72 10.1 WORKS CITED .........................................................................................................................
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